Category: Live Review

“Another highlight from Thursday were Jouis, they are a group who’ve been around forever, but one I’ve rarely seen live. I get the impression they are a bit of a collective, either that or they’ve shed a few members since I last caught an incarnation of the group. The set presented tonight was an all-singing three-piece combo of keys, baritone guitar (able to hit the low bass notes and soar up to higher lead licks) and drums playing some phenomenal retro psychedelia. On the strength of this performance they’re an act that should be filling tents in every medium sized festival in the land, but I fear they may lack the agency to get there.”

‘The intelligent structuring of their songs may have been the most refreshing aspect of their gig: many songs were clearly designed to move from the abstract into the destructive, showing off plenty of instrumental imagination along the way. Jouis played with skill, style, and with an underlying wildness that hinted at some untamed aspect to their music. Their nods to the traditions of psychedelia were many and obvious, but at no point did they feel old or reproductive’